Completed in 1937, Washington’s Headquarters Museum was one of the first museums planned and constructed by the National Park Service. Architect John Russell Pope designed it to memorialize General George Washington and to provide the park with a facility for exhibitions, meetings, lectures, and collections storage, using George Washington’s home, Mount Vernon, as inspiration for the design. A Depression-era project, the building was constructed under the authority of the Public Works Administration at a total cost of $139,000. Construction began in December 1935, and the building was dedicated on Washington’s Birthday, February 22, 1937. The museum has since been expanded twice to accommodate its research library, and today it features interactive exhibits and galleries displaying furniture, weapons, documents, and a wide variety of objects from the Colonial and Revolutionary periods, along with an auditorium, museum store, curatorial storage, and administrative offices.